Have you been a subscriber of a magazine with a very strong political or religious message?
Where only limited feedback is allowed and opposite views are neglected?
This reminds me of Richard Dawking and his memes thinking, viruses in minds. Susan Blackmore puts it: "Conformity, not creativity, is the hallmark of the human condition". I hope that this is not the case.
I would like to provide here an example.
The local newspaper (Ylöjärven Uutiset) was rather unwilling to publish my request to change their editorial line. In my note to the editor, I asked him, why the front page of the newspaper was about bishop's inspection, why the 3rd page was filled with church news and why the 4th page was full of parish election announcements. It was very difficult to read just basic, local news from this kind of newspaper. This request (reader feedback) of mine was never published. When I called the editor in chief, he was very hostile, even though I asked him very kindly to publish my note. Three weeks after that incident, the newspaper changed it's editorial line a bit, not much. I guess I was not the only one asking, companies paying for advertisements were not happy either ;-)
In that sense, citizen journalism and freedom of speech are great liberties. "We are the Media, said Dan Gillmore and I truly believe that he is a visionary thinker. When there is a topic that can not be discussed, the discussion finds it's ways.
Well, Finland seems to be number one in Press Freedom Index. Still, we still may have lot to improve in reader opinion management ...
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